Derek has written an interesting post over at the Bit-Blot blog, talking about Aquaria's evolution as a game and some of the design decisions that drove its direction. It's part four of a seven day ramp up to the game's release on Friday.

Parts one, two, and three have been great, well worth checking out if you haven't already seen them: Part one featured some of Derek's concept art (shown above), part two featured an excellent arrangement of some of the game's music by Alec, and part three featured a lengthy and entertaining interview with Jenna Sharpe, the voice actress for Naija.

Christ, it's a promising indie game that's been in development for two year, that won the IGF, and is coming out in a couple of days time. Naturally enough people are talking about it. And not nearly as much as you imply.

I don't get this attitude. Why doesn't it capture the indie spirit? Because it's for sale? Because it's polished? Because it's being hyped?

The indie spirit is making the game you want to make, the way you want to make it, without having any of your ideals raped along the way. The scale of this game and the period over which it was made clearly shows that it encapsulates the indie spirit. It takes quite an effort to get a team to work effectively for that long on something, especially remotely. From what I've read (which is little) there's been a lot of personal investment in this title, and that is as indie as it gets.

If you aren't signed to a publisher, you're an indy game designer, even if you decide to sell your game for money independently. I'm not sure what this "spirit" of indy games is you refer to. Indy isn't a spirit, it's a definition. This game fits that definition.

And I quite frankly wouldn't care even if it didn't. It's a gorgeous game that I am totally looking forward to playing :).

Indeed, if the indie spirit is to have unpolished and/or unfinished game that never release.

Hahaha, but isn't it?

Shit, indie just means you're not under direction from some uppity so and so's who control all the money. These guys made a huge game the way they wanted it to be made and not with the suits telling them to "Um.. make the girl's bikini smaller so she can make our 10-15 year old male demographic jump drool and purchase it by the score... BUT at the same time, make her overly smart so that our 14-22 year old female demographic will have someone to look up to.. a.. a ROLE MODEL! Ok, now have it done by 9am Thursday. Oh, and Alec go and grab me a coffee will ya? Black with 3 Splendas."